Gin

I'm a collector, possibly even a hoarder by nature, it's obvious when you look at my books - which are hard to avoid looking at. They're everywhere around my flat, but there are other things which are a little less obvious.

My yarn stash is mostly tucked away in drawers, and as I lack for cellar all my better wine, whisky, and gin is fighting for space in my wardrobe. I started pulling things out of there last night in a failed attempt to find a missing shoe, which in turn made me think I ought to take stock of what gin I actually had.

The answer turned out to be these 41 lovelies. Almost half of them have been presents - so people obviously know I like gin (they're right, I do), but I suspect I like collecting even more. The litre bottles of the Tanqueray editions for example - it's going to be a struggle to open those, and the same with the beautifully decorative Rock Rose Autumn and winter bottles. The Sipsmith V. J. O. P is strong enough to be quite intimidating.

Mostly though, as I sit looking at these whilst drinking a coffee, I'm thinking some of them want drinking before I can let myself buy anything else (presents don't count, any gift gin will be accepted with enthusiasm). Last year I had a mini gin festival with a friend to raise some money for charity - which was an excellent way to clear out a few half finished bottles, and fun, but I don't have enough open bottles to want to do that again just yet.

It's probably lucky that my partner has an even bigger stash of single malts, and perfectly understands both the impulse to collect, and the idea that some are for 'best' and not to be opened lightly. Gin isn't collectable in the same way - non of these are likely to increase in value but they're fun to collect and have gathered quite a bit of sentimental value in the acquisition process (we spent ages tracking down a Rock Rose Autumn, the Tanqueray Bloomsbury came from a beer shop in Shetland where I did not expect to find it, the Christopher Wren gin from the City of London distillery was another adventure to find and so on...).

Meanwhile, if you know where to find me and fancy a G&T/martini or similar, I think I've probably got it covered. There's even plenty of ice in the freezer.